As a lo-fi sci-fi franchise, Code 8 possesses plenty of potential to serve as the basis for an entire universe of street-level stories, and that seems to be the plan. The downside is that there have been a couple of notable roadblocks to overcome, with the prospective saga currently stuck in limbo.
Director Jeff Chan turned his 2016 short into a feature that boasts a fascinating conceit; people with superhuman abilities exist in our world, but they’re treated like outcasts and forced into menial jobs defined by the way they’ve been categorized in relation to their abilities.
Robbie Amell’s down on his luck laborer wants more – and needs it to pay for his mother’s medical care – forcing him into an alliance with cousin Stephen’s criminal. An underground cult favorite that nabbed a stellar 81 percent Rotten Tomatoes score, Code 8 gained a huge surge in popularity after being added to Netflix in April 2020.
A sequel series was announced, but it ended up dying on the vine due to its status as a Quibi original, with the doomed streaming service vanishing from existence in embarrassingly quick fashion. That being said, Netflix swooped in again to give the green light to Code 8: Part II, which began shooting in November of 2021.
And yet… where is it? Robbie Amell hinted he’d even be open to a threequel, but we’re almost two years removed from the second chapter filming and there’s not even the merest whiff of a release date. Ironically, Code 8 is tearing it up again on a streamer that isn’t Netflix, with FlixPatrol naming it as one of the biggest hits on Starz this weekend. That’ll do for now, but we really need Part II in our lives sooner rather than later.